Love-me-not
by Lunadora
Summary: What would you do if you loved someone so much that this love would hurt you instead of bringing you happiness? This fanfic brings a bit of my own feelings towards a special someone portrayed in Alisa, the sweet and lovely nun from Harvest Moon series. Come join her as she learn about love and how bittersweet it can be.
1. Boys and Men

There is a man that I loved deeply but that didn't appreciate my love. This fanfic was written with him in mind. Hope you guys enjoy it.

* * *

What if you loved someone so much that this love would hurt you instead of bringing you happiness? Alisa was a common girl, living in the countryside of a peaceful country. Life was always the same, everyday repeating itself like a movie. She would wake up early to go to school, a very renowned female college around the area. Lots of girls from other towns would come to study there because of its good reputation. It was in this place that Alisa fell in love for the first time.

"Good morning teacher!"  
"Good morning girls!"  
The young girls left giggling, happy for getting a good morning from their favourite teacher. Truth is that said teacher was the only male around and, to help with his fame, he was pretty young himself. And married. With a woman that loved him deeply. But most of the girls didn't mind it at all.  
"It is our youth, let us be happy and love whoever we want!"  
Alisa wasn't that different from them. But she was too shy to even look him in the eye. All she'd look at would be his back when they crossed ways on the corridors. He wasn't too tall, not too strong, but his smile could light a whole soccer field. That's what the girls would say. And when the girls gathered to talk about boys the teacher would always be mentioned.  
"I finally got a boyfriend," one of them said, getting all proud of herself with the other girls sighs and questions about him. "But I won't quit liking him. He's too handsome for me to quit it just 'cause I have a boyfriend now."  
The girls that were listening giggled for a moment before getting quiet as the bell rang, announcing the next class.  
"It's his turn, isn't it?"  
"Yup."  
And the whole class got quiet.

A girl was standing beside his car, her face was blushing while she looked to her feet.  
"I love you!" She blurted out.  
She ended up saying it louder than she wanted, so taking the chance while her courage was gathered she looked up to him, noticing the fear in his eyes before kissing him and running away like a thief abandoning the crime scene. The teacher was stunned for a moment until he realized what happened. Looking around himself to see if there was any witnesses he saw, behind the bushes, a pair of blue eyes rounded by red hair. Alisa was as surprised as her teacher and ran away as fast as she could when she noticed she was seen, feeling like she had seen something she should not.

"I need to explain myself!" He asked insistently while holding her arm.  
"I saw nothing, I heard nothing and you don't need to explain anything to me sir. Please, let me go," she pleaded.  
Alisa knew what would happen if anyone else saw her in that kind of situation. Ever since she saw the other girl's confession her dearest teacher would follow her around, trying to explain what happened, while she would insistently run away from him, afraid. She wasn't a very good runner and had low stamina which helped the teacher to get a hold of her after chasing her around the corridors. He didn't call her since he was chasing after a student but he felt like he needed to explain. And he felt bad for seeing her flushed and breathless. She, on the other hand, couldn't say if her heart was beating fast because he was holding her arm of because of all the running. Fact was: he was standing there, wanting to tell her something she didn't need nor wanted to know. Even so, she allowed herself to listen to him.  
"It was an accident, I didn't think she would try to kiss me. Please, don't tell anyone about it, I'm just a newbie, it would be a problem if this kind of information leaked."  
"Don't worry," she allowed herself to cut his speech. "I won't tell anything to anybody."  
"I'm glad," he sighed in relief, and his smile was really like a source of light. A light so bright that it blinded Alisa to the fact that they were being seen by other girls from a distance.

She left her guard off for a second and that was enough for trouble to jump in on her life. She was never a talkative girl but she never had troubles to communicate with her classmates. However rumors spread quickly, even more in a female school. Before she knew it, she had become a target.  
"That's the girl, isn't it?"  
"It is her, I'm sure."  
Alisa would listen to people whispering around her but she couldn't understand what they were saying. Until a group of girls purposely bumped on her and dropped her books, without looking back or even bothering to help her to gather them. It wasn't rare that other girls that were passing by would step on her books while they were on the ground. Her desk would always have scribbles and she tried very hard to clean them, afraid that if a teacher would see it they'd think she was the one who made it. Time passed and she started to lose the willingness to go to school. She only did because her mother insisted.  
"You need to study, dear. It's important for your future!"

It was through a lot of hardships that Alisa managed to get to the end of that semester. Her teacher didn't seem as special as before since he did notice she was having troubles but didn't move a finger to help her. With no friends and no regrets, Alisa decided to move to another school.  
"A mixed one?" Her mother asked, surprised. "I thought you liked this one. You tried so hard to get in!"  
"Please mother," was all that Alisa could say.  
Her mother wasn't too demanding so she agreed. The new semester came and Alisa had to take a bus to go to her new school, in the neighboor town, but she didn't mind it. What she did mind was the massive presence of boys all around. Her red hair and her shy personality made her an easy target to bullying. It was amidst this hell that she found her new love. A guy her own age. That had a girlfriend.  
She didn't know that he had a girlfriend when she first met him. People told her later on that the girl was older than him and was already in the university so they didn't see each other that often. Alisa even thought if she should put some distance between them but in the end she couldn't do it. She caught herself thinking more than once why she liked him so much, without really having a definitive answer. He wasn't the most handsome of the guys in the school, his grades were on the average and he wasn't too good in sports. He wasn't too talkative, just like her, but he was kind to everyone. She felt even more attracted to him when he would protect her against the bullying. Whenever someone called her by a nickname, he'd scold them.  
"Her name is Alisa!" He'd say with a serious face.  
The other boys teased him but he didn't care. Neither Alisa. She started to think that, if he was by her side, she could continue having her small happiness. With things as they were she really started to believe that the girlfriend was only a story told by someone to keep the other girls away from him. Like it was some lie made up to keep him from other girls.  
_"Only makes me want to get even closer to him,"_ she thought.  
And on the last year of her studies Alisa got really close to him. So close that she was scared when an older girl showed up. Her hair was red jus like Alisa's but her body was that of a woman and she was dressed in graceful clothes. Very different from the uniform that Alisa had to use.  
"What's your name, girl?" She asked.  
"Alisa," she replied sheepishly.  
"Good, you're the one I'm looking for," the other said with a small smile. "You know Alisa, I've been hearing rumors. And I am not really liking them. Can you imagine what kind of rumors?"  
Alisa shook her head in a no and the other girl's smile disappeared, her voice's tune changing.  
"People have told me that you've been flirting with my boyfriend."  
The other girl didn't need to say anything more. Alisa's heart stopped for a second, her hands started to sweat and her body started to shake.  
_"This is the girlfriend. It was real after all,"_ she thought, her heart being torn to pieces as she realized that.  
Alisa waited for the girl to stop talking to explain things, lying about her feelings. It wasn't like she was planning to confess to him. It was her own feelings and she thought she'd be able to deal with them by herself without bothering anyone.  
"He's only my friend," she finally said. "Only a friend."  
"Oh really?" The girl asked, facing Alisa for a second before giving a wicked smile. "Of course. He wouldn't replace me for someone like you."  
Alisa thought she was already used to the bullying. But on that moment the pain she felt was worse than any nicknames or evil doings that he had gone through. She slowly started to shy away from people. Finished her studies just like her mother wanted her to and decided she'd lock herself in an abbey. The chances of being hurt by love in a place like that were null, was what she thought, and there would be a lot more of older people, so things would run smoothly.  
"Men are evil. I need to keep my distance from them," was what she decided.


	2. Wild Flowers

When you're a child and watch movies like **_Sister Act_** or **_The sound of Music_** you might, unconsciously, get the wrong impression of an abbey. Alisa was one of those people that got fooled by the movies.  
"Why do you want to join the abbey?" The mother superior asked after reading Alisa's registration form.  
"I want to serve the Harvest Goddess," was her prompt answer.  
Alisa had read and reread the questions in the form and decorated the answers she thought would help her to get into the abbey. That was her great mistake.  
"I don't want such a simple answer. What happened to you that made you search for us in such a desperate way?"  
_"Desperate?"_  
Alisa was confused after hearing such a word. Did she really look so desperate? Her main reason to get into the abbey was to seclude herself from any kind of men, hoping she wouldn't fall in love again. That's all she wanted.  
_"But the mother superior will most likely refuse me if I answer something like that, right?"_ She thought.  
The mother superior crossed her hands over the table and watched, trying not to giggle from time to time because of the faces Alisa was doing. The girl was debating with herself the possibility to tell to the mother superior all about her sad (and short) love life. But in the end she decided it was better not and looked into her eyes.  
"The world is hostile, mother," she began. "I found cruelty in places I never could imagine I would. I want to become a nun to bring comfort to the ones that need it."  
The mother superior raised a brow. The girl tried really hard and managed to answer in a very generic way. It made her curious, wanting to know more. But she noticed she shouldn't push Alisa too hard.  
_"When she feels she's ready, she will tell me herself,"_ she thought, and continued with the questions.

It was spring and the nuns were dividing their functions accordingly. The older ones did the charity work since they noticed people opened up easily to elders. The rest of them were divided into production and distribution of resources. Alisa didn't want to deal with people so she thought it'd be safer to work in the production. They sent her to work at the orchard. And there she couldn't help but miss something.  
"Why there aren't any flowers?" She asked to one of the older sisters.  
"Flowers can't be used to make dishes, can they?" She answered in an irritated tone. "We are here to plant and harvest edible crops. That's what this orchard was created for. Forget about the flowers, they have no place in here."  
After saying that the sister just turned around to continue her own job. Alisa felt desolated and decided to just follow her instructions. That's when she noticed some small wild flowers around the trunk of a tree. Afraid that one of the nuns could just destroy them thinking they were weeds Alisa carefully dug around them to remove and relocate them. She just had to hide them until the work hours were finished. It didn't take long for her to decide on a place. Nearby there were some blueberry bushes, so she hid the flowers in the middle of them.  
"You'll be safe here. I will take care of you, just wait a bit."

As the seasons were changing the nuns noticed that Alisa was up to something. She'd always excuse herself to stay behind at the orchard and, as time was passing by, it would take longer for her to come back from her work.  
"She must be meeting someone. We should make a trap and get her in the act."  
The mother superior didn't think badly of Alisa so she had a hard time believing the other nuns but she had no other choice other than oblige. Something was happening, that was a fact, and she was getting curious too. And it was in a nice, sunny day that they put their plans into action. When Alisa told them she forgot something back at the orchard they waited a bit and followed her from afar. However, they didn't know what to do or how to react when they saw Alisa working, all by herself, in a small field of flowers, not too far away from the orchard.  
"I told you that we don't plant flowers in here, didn't I?" One of the nuns scolded.  
"But we serve the harvest Goddess, don't we?" Alisa asked after muttering all her courage. "Flowers are a kind of crop too, aren't they?"  
Alisa knelt and prayed, wishing for a way, any way, to save her flowers, tears rolling down her face. That's when she heard a far away voice that was so dear to her, and her heart was filled with hope.  
"It's enough."  
It was the mother superior's voice. The other nuns let her through and the one that had been scolding lisa forced her to stand on her feet, roughly wiping Alisa's tears.  
"Where did you get so many flowers Alisa?" The mother superior asked.  
"They're wild flowers ma'am," Alisa started, sniffing. "They were growing scattered around the tree's roots. I was afraid that the other nuns would kill them as weeds. So I brought them here and now I have a small garden, full of them. They're living beings too, mother superior. Please, don't let them destroy it," she asked amidst hiccups.  
The mother superior gently pressed a hand on Alisa's shoulders before guiding her back inside. The other nuns followed in silence.  
"I want to talk with Alisa by myself," the mother superior instructed. "Go ahead and dine, pray, do as you please, but I don't want to be disturbed."

"Do you like flowers that much Alisa?" She asked when they were all by themselves at her office.  
The girl was shy and afraid, so she nodded in response.  
"You have a big, loving heart Alisa," she started, noticing how Alisa seemed disturbed at the mention of the word _loving_. "You worked all by yourself to rescue and take care of those tiny flowers, without waiting for any recognition or reward. That's a noble attitude. And it shows you can't run away from your feelings."  
"What feelings?" The girl asked, euphoric.  
"The ones of love and care."  
"But I can suppress them if I need to," Aisa said quickly, thinking about her love experiences and not about the flowers. The mother superior noticed that.  
"You can't serve the church with such conflicts inside you," she replied.  
Alisa felt at a loss. She even forgot about the flowers she was trying to protect. All she could feel was the tightness in her chest.  
"I'll send you somewhere else "the mother continued after a pause. "One of our priests is travelling all over the world, teaching the Goddess way. I'm sure you'd be better by his side."  
"But what about my flowers?" Alisa asked, not really thinking about the flowers but about the fear of leaving what she already knew for the unknown.  
"Don't you worry about that," the mother said, caressing Alisa's red hair. "I'll make sure that they're well tended. And I'll send you pictures every month so you can see how they're doing."  
Alisa smiled, but her smile was full of sadness. And even though they didn't exchange any more words after that, Alisa felt that the mother was the closest person to her.


End file.
